Curious Geek. Husband. Father. Educator.

Merry Christmas! Our roof is leaking!

We had a wonderful day today – got up, went to church, came home and baked, played, and listened to Christmas music. Everyone got along, and there was just a general feeling of peace of happiness in our family today. It was really, really great.

Tonight, Rachel made a wonderful Christmas Eve dinner, and after that, we had Emma set out her plate of cookies and note for Santa, and drove around looking at Christmas lights (mainly so the kids would fall asleep ;-)).

However, not all is rosy in the Bancroft household today.

We got home a few minutes ago, and I carried Emma up to her bed and noticed that her pillow was wet. I thought she spilled a glass a water (it has happened before), but I looked up, and noticed a nice “drip, drip” coming from the ceiling.

Apparently, some of those roof shingles that we found in our backyard after last week’s windstorm were important – our roof is leaking. 🙁

Any ideas or suggestions on what to do? We’ve only been homeowners for about a year. I know we need to get someone to come and fix it, but it’s going to next week a the soonest, given the time of year. And I have no idea how much to pay – I don’t want to get ripped off. Anyone have any recommendations for a roof repair person in the west Portland/Washington County area?

Oh, and Merry Christmas to everyone! Hope you have a wonderful holiday! I know I will, even with this in the back of my mind…

Gah! Sorry to hear about the roof. I guess me complaining about a lack of snow isn’t really a valid reason to complain at all 🙂
Anyways, Merry Christmas to The Bancrofts and a Happy New Year (guaranteed, since CES and MacWorld are only days into 2007)

Sorry to hear about the roof Josh. I don’t have any roofer suggestions but I’m in Florida where we lose more than our share of shingles to hurricanes. You do need to tack a tarp over the area missing shingles. It’s important for your insurance company that you show that you didn’t make things worse through inaction.

Also, if the wind storm lifted shingles on other parts of your roof they may have dirt and debris under them and not seal properly and you get a new roof.

This is where digital camera + OneNote can be a big help to show what went wrong. Insurance companies LOVE pictures and documentation!

As an interim solution you could tarp off the area on the roof where you believe the rain is coming in from. This way you can limit the amount of water getting into the house until they can come and fix it. If you can get into your attic see if you can locate where the drip and put a bucket under it on the inside to help limit the water damage to the drywall.

When you get a quote for fixing the roof see if they’ll include drying out the attic space. You don’t want mold forming from any pooled water in the attic. You could do it yourself if you want, mostly just need to pull up the insulation, soak up the excess water and put out a few fans to dry.

First check on Angie’s List (http://www.angieslist.com/AngiesList/) for a contractor, or ask your friends and neighbors. Get 2-3 estimates. Any respectible roofing company will come, inspect the roof, and give you a written estimate.

Next, expect to spend anywhere from $300 – $4000 depending on the nature of the problem. If all you are talking about is a few shingles that flew off, then it will be inexpensive. If the problem is something else, and requires a bunch of roofing material to be removed, then it will cost more.

Hi I was searching the net for anything about roof leaks and found your site here and see you have the same exact problem as us , we live in a bungalow and our first floor bedrm. has a leak thats coming from the ceiling and its exactly in the same area on the roof that a long shingle fell off to the ground recently !Yikes im freaked out I see this happened to you in Dec . so im wondering did you fix the problem and how much did this cost and what did they do to fix it ? I would really appreciate your input thanks soo much…